The Fort

This was a short story I tweeted over three days for the #TwitterFiction Festival. I'd pitched my story to the Twitter Fiction judges before the festival, and made it to round two (of three)! Last year I didn't even get considered. I didn't make the final round this year, but maybe I will next year! Enjoy :)

CHAPTER ONE

“Bars, pubs, watering wells or whatever your word for it; always have a motley collection of regulars, kid,”

Lance had the back of the young man’s neck in a cobra clutch and had leapt over the fence of what usually constituted private space about five drinks ago.

“You have the piss drunk patrons that you can always count on to be unconscious, no matter which day and no matter what hour,” he slurred in Tiny Thulani’s ear.

“You also have the types always looking to pick up inebriated voluptuous females. The ones you wouldn’t be happy to wake up next to in the head-pounding morning.”

Tiny Thulani looked around the smoke hazed room and could identify all the unsavoury characters Lance pointed out. The unconscious one drooling on his collar but firmly clutching his beer; the borderline perverted one that was only there for the voluptuous but lacking in the pretty facial features department--

--“…and then you have the fisticuffs instigators. The ones that’ll start a fight over any debate, wrong look or slight brush of the shoulder. I’m the latter,” Lance turned and smiled at Tiny, “I love a good fight,”

Lance was the resident shit stirrer at The Fort, a dingy little bathroom corner that attracted all the kind of people he loved to shove fists down the throats of. He regularly precipitated knuckles on unsuspecting and most times, undeserving people.

Small, dirty drinking holes deprived of coats of paint, properly functioning plumbing and award winning customer service came by the dozen. But what made The Fort special was that it was one of a handful of establishments that still catered to super powered humans [one of the reasons why the pub had a ‘no frills’ policy. The Fort’s proprietor squeezed out just enough of the profits to install reinforced adamantium counters and doors; special padding and easily reassembling furniture, because fights were commonplace among supers. The bottles and pitchers however, remained glass].

“Since I’m out of conventional employment, I spend most of my days here!” Lance said spilling a little brew on his listener’s sleeve. He practically lived at The Fort.

Things had not always been so grim. About ten years ago, Lance was a celebrated superhero and he’d spent his days foiling super villainy and fighting in the pantheon of champions like Stronghold of the Power Squad! and the Tenaka Twins in Japan. The world sang their praises and built statues in their honour. But all that is now just a stain on humanity’s collective conscious.

CHAPTER TWO

Unlike the pretty picture pop-culture will sell you, superheroes aren’t always nice people. There were ‘incidents’ people no longer spoke of; incidents that led to the policing of all supers and passing of legislation that strictly prohibited the use of powers--supernatural or otherwise--if it wasn’t in the service of respective governments. All vigilantes were arrested and sometimes even executed. Heroes for hire and their unions were disbanded and unfair taxes and fines imposed on them. Those that hid their tails between their legs and enlisted for national service were the few that remained ‘heroes’. Not even a whisper of super criminals and villains passed the lips of people. They were dealt an even harsher blow.

Lance and others like him refused a life of forced servitude. They vehemently opposed the new legislation and chose to live away from the newly prescribed society. They formed little communities that resembled ghettos and were policed regularly by drones and armoured humans. Places like The Fort were a kind of refuge.

“I still wear this uniform as a sign of honour, Tiny” Lance said with palpable nostalgia. He held his beer mug as if searching its contents for a particular memory.

“WE WERE GLADIATORS, KID!” He’d gotten up with one boot on the bar stool and another on the counter, leaning toward the bar like a triumphant hunter with a foot on the neck of his trophy. Tiny Thulani was nervous.

“The people would come out to watch us do battle with monstrosities cooked up from the darkest labs and lairs!” Lance was beating his chest and spilling beer all over the counter, “The people braved flying debris and even harmful radiation to watch us triumph over evil!”

Lance paused, “Until they became the evil…”

“Ah, Ba Lance naimwe! Spare us the sob stories! We’ve heard it all before,” said Chilu, the hero formerly known as, Ember.

Lance turned to look at Chilu. He didn’t like to be interrupted.

“Mind your own business, Ember! I wasn’t addressing your face!”

“Get over it, you bum!” Chilu replied, “We all have! Get a real job. Maybe even start a family and sentence someone else to this punishing story time you inflict on us daily!”

The Fort erupted in laughter.

“So I can grow up to be just like you, huh, Ember?”

“I don’t go by that anymore,”

“BECAUSE YOU LIVE A FAÇADE!” shouted Lance. “At least I stay true to myself! You all just took on different masks! You became a bloody accountant for goodness sake, Ember!”

The Fort was silent.

“You all cowered and pretended we never fought for any ideals. Like we didn’t symbolize anything. Like we were all just merry men in tights prancing around for the cameras! Dammit, we inspired the very sheep that turned into wolves on us and forced us into this dirty little corner! Why should we live like we never mattered?”

“So what do you suggest we do, Lance?” said Chilu, “Start a revolution? Isn't this the same guy that takes part in that barbaric Friday night fight club? Tearing at each other for peanuts and the entertainment of brain-dead individuals!”

“I do what I need to, to keep food on my table and keep the ZESCO on,”

“What you need to do is go home, you bum. You’re drunk and pissing allover our solace,” Chilu said.

Lance got down from his stool and walked over to Chilu’s table. His drunken act seemed to have subsided and it looked like his anger had burnt all the alcohol in his blood. Chilu stood up and towered over Lance. The two stood toe to toe and stared each other down.

CHAPTER THREE

“Or do you not have a home?”

The patrons of The Fort correctly predict it, but they didn’t actually see Lance’s fist connect with Chilu’s jaw. It happened so fast it would make a bolt of lightning cower in shame.

Chilu was knocked across the room, crashing through tables and breaking beer bottles in his path. Lance then lunged at him and received a concentrated heat blast from Chilu’s palms; his hands glowing in a fierce red and giving a visual anecdote of how he’d earned the name, Ember. Lance didn’t notice the flames on his beloved uniform jacket. All he could see in his mind were his fists making contact with Chilu’s face and landscaping his facial features. The flames did little to harm Lance’s skin; his power was near invulnerability. The heat blast intensified and flung a toasty Lance towards Tiny Thulani. Tiny shrunk to the size of a shot glass and dodged his frying friend.

Lance picked up the shrunken Tiny and leapt at Chilu again, dodging flares as he charged on. He grabbed Chilu by his throat and forcefully shoved his miniature friend down Chilu’s oesophagus.

“GROW!” Lance commanded Tiny.

What sounded like a muffled protest could be heard from the shrinking-man inside Chilu’s neck.

“I’ll do worse than that if you don’t! Now GROW dammit!”

A lump began to grow from the flame thrower’s throat, choking him in the process. He clutched his neck and streamed saliva from the sides of his mouth. Lance and the rest of The Fort watched, both in disgust and crude amusement. Chilu placed his palm on the growing lump and sent a pint-size heat wave through his neck. Tiny Thulani jumped out of the mouth he’d been forced down wailing in pain and growing back to full size by the time he hit the ground. His clothes were sizzling and patches of his skin had scalded.

Chilu coughed and spewed out his last beer, tasting the trail of Tiny’s travels that day since his boots had been on his tongue. He placed his hand on the adamantium counter top and sent his rage through his palms. Lance had not noticed this and blindly went in for a head-butt. Chilu side-stepped to dodge the blow and palmed the back of Lance’s head. He then bashed the head in his palm onto the sweltering hot counter top and sent a fiery fury down Lance’s ear.

“You tried to kill me, you asshole!” raged Chilu.

Lance’s face began to smoke and even his near invulnerability would soon not be able to take the solar flare of Chilu’s hands.

Before Lance could retaliate, the two former heroes received crippling shocks of electricity from two very large bouncers. “No fighting,” they said simultaneously.

 The fighters both got up on one knee and looked at each other. “You bastard, you ruined my jacket!” said Lance, “You ruined my friggin’ jacket!”

Chilu said nothing and wiped the blood from his swollen lip. He lit his index finger and lightly burned the cut in his lip closed.

Superheroes and their abilities vary. Some may be invulnerable or are able to take immense amounts of pain; but even they got their feelings hurt. Their words had cut through the cigarette smoke and smell of hard liquor. Lance and Chilu; both tired from the fighting and the current state of their world dusted themselves off. Each man had spoken the truth, neither more truthful than the other. Each man cut deep. Their physical wounds would heal at an accelerated rate, but both were yet to heal from the wounds humanity had inflicted on them so long ago.

The music continued to play and in a few minutes, the pub was buzzing like nothing had happened. It was just another Thursday evening at, The Fort.

THE END

Power Squad!: From Henchforth

Now, your life does not absolutely depend on it, but I suggest you read the first installment of Power Squad! by clicking here.
If you have already, then jump right in!

NOBODY MOVE! This is a stick up!!”

The customers inside the bank took one nonchalant look at Chanda and then continued about their business. Chanda was baffled. Surely the mask he had crafted by cutting eye-holes into the oversized head-sock his grandma had given him last Christmas was menacing. It may have been bright and multi-coloured, but everyone knew that masks were meant to be menacing, didn’t they?

“I said, NOBODY MOVE!! This is a friggin’ stick—”

“Allo, boyi, this isn’t the time or the place for that nonsense.”

Chanda looked back to put a face to the voice that had interrupted him. The large security guard before him towered about 7 nephilim feet over him.

 His muscles bulged and stretched the fabric of his uniform shirt so tightly that if one of his buttons shot free, it could have taken somebody’s eye out. He was clutching a baton in his huge right hand and kept smacking it against his left palm in an intimidating gesture.

Chanda swallowed.

“Do you know how many masked maniacs we get here every day?” the guard continued. “And they at least have the decency to come with a real gun. Even the most bat-eyed customer here can spot that silly kindergarten paint on your BB gun.”

If Chanda hadn’t been frantically blinking and tearing up because of a stray strand of wool caught in his eye from his badly cut head-sock, he would have been looking down at his plastic gun in shame. It was a pretty pathetic paint job he had done, but he had to make do with half a can of black spray paint.

“This is one of the roughest parts of town, super villains bank here and every once in a while they try to start something.  Even the customers don’t take shit.”

“See that sweet old lady over there?” the guard said nodding his head in the direction of a prune skinned old woman standing at the ‘Customer Service’ counter. She looked like she had lived at least a century.

“Why, just last week that very same lady took down Doctor what’s-his-face and his über lazertron gun or whatever because he cut in line and tried to hold up the place.”

Chanda’s eyes twitched and blinked some more.

“So you see son,” the guard said almost empathetically, “if you’re going to rob THIS bank, come with some serious artillery and don’t leave your nuts at home. Now get out of here before I shove this baton down your throat.”

To say Chanda’s caper had failed terribly would be an understatement.  Forget bruised, his ego had been scraped with sandpaper and beaten with a standard issue security guard baton. He sat down on the ground outside the bank with his back against the wall and began to reassess his values. He started to listen to that inner voice that proceeds to beat down your self esteem after you have just received an emotionally scathing verbal thrashing.

 What were you thinking? The voice asked. You couldn’t have pulled that off if you had the devil himself's face for a mask, and a bazooka for a gun! Get real, you can’t make it out here. Grams told you to stay with her. But no, you had to go and move to the big city, didn’t you? You had to become a man. Tell me Chanda, do you feel like a man now? Are you blazing your own trail like you thought you would?

 Leaving everything he knew and coming to the big city was a tough decision for him. His Grandma had tried to convince him otherwise, but she realised it was something he felt he had to do.

“You go ahead and leave good ‘ol granny all on her lonesome,” she had said trying to make him feel a little guilt, “I’ll be fine. I just hope you will too. I’ve heard funny stories about the city. Flying men and scantily clad women are the norm according to the television. But I trust this desire of yours to move is embedded deep in your bones now. Just remember you’ll always have a home here,” she said, and then whispered, “As long as I’m alive.”

 Chanda asked his Grandma to dismiss that kind of talk and assured her she would probably even outlive him. He promised he would visit her often and even send some money every now and then, and then he hugged her.

 Heading back home seemed like a great plan right about then. Grams would probably poke fun at him and be a little cynical, but she’d definitely be glad to see him. She would probably prepare his favourite mash and ribs too. His stomach growled in agreement.

But this was not the time to be feeling sorry for himself, no! This was not the time to tuck in his tail, lick his wounds and cower in fear! It was the time to take action! A time to be proactive! He got up and dusted his rear end. He was going back to the drawing board.

 If luck and coincidence had a love-child, it would happen to manifest itself in the form of a marital squabble that broke out right across from where Chanda was standing. Of course this was no ordinary fight between spouses. Being the town that it was, two super villains were bound to break into a heated confrontation in the street. He would never have guessed that it would be between a married couple.

The two villains had been arguing violently from inside their car and had halted traffic in the process. You could see arms flailing and finger pointing from outside the car windows. When the argument had gotten intense, they both stepped out of their vehicle and began to hurl vulgar unmentionables at each other. But unmentionables were not all they would hurl.

The lady opened the back door of their vehicle, pulled out an M1 bazooka and began to load it with a round. Her significant other guessed she meant business and fidgeted with his watch before it suddenly morphed and wrapped him in a suit of battle armour.

Divorce proceedings would not be necessary between the two, as they simultaneously blasted each other into oblivion within seconds. Their bodies became nothing but plies of human mincemeat with traces of nanobots and metal alloys. The lady villain’s bazooka remained intact. Chanda saw an opportunity.

He quickly ran toward the scene of the violent marriage annulment and picked up the heavy bazooka. It had a camouflage finish and looked like it could take out the hide of any tank. He then proceeded to the car of the now deceased couple to see if there were more rocket rounds. He found only one. It sat right under a diablo mask. How’s that for the devil’s face?

Chanda had to move quickly before the fuzz arrived on the scene, but he contemplated getting a little practice before he could return to the bank. This was no time to practice his marksmanship though, he only had one round. And besides, who could possibly miss their target if they were toting a friggin’ bazooka?

How’s this for serious artillery? Chanda thought as he remembered the words of the security guard. We’ll see who really left their nuts at home when I come knocking at your stupid bank door with this baby!

One or two people fled from Chanda’s path as they saw him walking across the street and struggling a little to lift the canon he’d just commandeered, but it was not unusual for someone to be flaunting heavy duty weaponry and wearing a devil’s mask in this town. It was not unusual at all.

Chanda stood a few meters away from the bank’s entrance and waited for his security guard friend to notice him from inside the glass doors. When they had locked eyes, he brought his bazooka up and flung its length onto his shoulder, mustered up the best Scarface impression he could and roared, “SAY HELLO TO MY LITTLE FRIEND!”

The rocket fired from the bazooka spiralled in a corkscrew motion and propelled itself toward the glass doors. The sinister shark head painted on the front end of the rocket made it look like it would chomp right through the glass and shatter it into a million pieces. But as fate would have it, luck had filed for a paternity test on that love-child it had with coincidence and it turned out that child did not belong to luck.

The security guard flashed a smirk as the rocket ricocheted off the glass doors with a ‘thump’, leaving only the faintest trace of a scratch. People would not usually flee from a madman with a bazooka in this town, but they sure as hell fled from a rocket fired from a bazooka. The missile flew wildly and spiralled out of control leaving a trail of smoke while missing a number of passersby and hissing toward Chanda with its menacing shark-toothed grin. He ran for his life.

The rocket exploded on impact and sent him flying across the pavement along the busy street. He landed with his head in between his arms and scraped his elbows as he slid across the ground. The bruises running down his forearms stung a little, but Chanda had expected to be in much more pain if he had been hit by a missile. But the missile hadn’t hit him.

When he got up to see what had happened, he found Captain Justice—the town’s self appointed super champion of justice, and leader of the Power Squad—floating above him. He had taken the impact and detonated the explosion from the rocket.

“You must be new around here son,” said Captain Justice, “everybody knows that those bank doors have reinforced fibreglass. Not even Doctor what-do-you-call-him’s mega lazertron gun or whatever could penetrate those doors.”

Chanda stood there in silence, sweating profusely under his mask.

“Now, regardless of whether you are new here or not, you do know that what you were trying to do is illegal, and you will have to face the full extent of the law?”

Chanda nodded. Perhaps he should have stayed back home with Grams. He had ruined his clothes, he would probably face criminal charges and worst of all, a superhero was carrying him by the scruff of his shirt and delivering him to a police car.

The large security guard slapped some handcuffs on his wrists as Captain Justice removed his mask. That self-esteem-beating inner voice began to speak again as he sat in the back of the police car but was suddenly interrupted by another voice coming from outside the car window.

“Hey, wait!” said the voice. Chanda looked outside.

A man in a perfectly fitting tailor made suit was doing an awkward trot up to the police car window.

“Hi kid,” the clean cut man said. “Looks like you’re in a bit of a fix aren’t you?”

“You think?” sneered Chanda.

“Do you need a job, kid?”

“Well, if you had come thirty minutes earlier, I might have said yes. But now it’s looking like I’m going away for a long time.”

“Not if I can get you legal representation,” said the man.

“Look, I don’t have any money and I don’t think I can afford to—”

“If you promise to work for the organisation I represent, I could get you out of this jam without any difficulty. You won’t even have to pay for a thing.”

Chanda knotted his brow, “Are you the illuminati?”

“Haha, hardly kid. But I would like a devil like you to work with us; we need people with your... tenacity.”

He thought about what the man was saying and weighed his options. What did he have to lose? “Can I at least think about it? I don’t even know what it is your organisation is into.”

“Ha ha, sure kid. Give me a call when you’re in and I’ll explain everything.”

And with that, the clean cut man handed Chanda a business card and left. It read:

‘YOSA GRANDMAN YOSA- LEGAL REPRESENTATIVE  HENCHMAN INC.’

TO BE CONTINUED...

 

 

Wicked art by my cousin Mutale, alias Styles. He came through and saved me with this one!

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